Olivia DrakeThe Wesleyan Board of Trustees recently awarded tenure to two faculty members. They are: Lois Brown, professor of African American studies, professor of English, came to Wesleyan last fall from Mount Holyoke College where she was Elizabeth Small Professor of English. At Mount Holyoke, where she began teaching in 1998, she was awarded the Distinguished Teaching Award in 2004, and was director of the Weissman Center for Leadership and the Liberal Arts for five years. A literary historian, she focuses on culture, identity, race and gender in 18th and 19th century African American writing. She is author of three books…
Krishna Winston, the Marcus L. Taft Professor of German Language and Literature, will attend a translators working meeting with Günter Grass Feb. 10-14 in Lübeck, Germany. Grass, 85, is novelist, poet, playwright, artist and sculptor. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1999. Winston has translated several of Grass's works, including his 1990 diary, From Germany to Germany, which was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in November 2012. This will be Winston's fourth meeting with Grass and fellow translators. The group will focus the discussion on Grass's poetry, autobiographical writings and artwork. "It's a pretty special thing when translators can sit down with the author for several…
Lauren RubensteinOn Jan. 11, Jeanine Basinger, the Corwin Fuller Professor of Film Studies, reviewed a new book, Hollywood Sketchbook, by Deborah Nadoolman Landis in The Wall Street Journal. Landis, a costume designer herself, “defines the difference between the designer’s costuming goal and the role of the sketch artist. Costume sketches were never intended to be fashion drawings: Kinetic, emotional and drawn for a specific personality or character, they were about much more than clothes,” writes Basinger. The book contains commentaries and reproduced sketches for 61 designers, including such famous names as Adrian (known for The Wizard of Oz, Camille, and Marie Antoinette, among…
During Wesleyan's winter recess, Vera Schwarcz, the Mansfield Freeman Professor of East Asian Studies, worked on a paratroopers' reservist base in Israel through Volunteers for Israel. The 30-year-old program seeks volunteers to promote solidarity and goodwill among Israelis, American Jews, and other friends of Israel. Each day, Schwarcz and 13 other volunteers in her group, reported for work in a warehouse overseen by a female officer, the mother of two young children. "We, the American volunteers worked alongside young soldiers (mostly 19-year-old girls) and male reservists in their late 20s - all sent to this base to help out with…
The Hartford Courant on Dec. 7 published an op-ed by Assistant Professor of Sociology Daniel Long about a new pilot program in Connecticut and four other states to increase time that children spend in school. Long responded skeptically to the program, writing that past experiments with increased learning time have shown mixed results, and are an expensive, unproven way to improve student learning. At a time when Connecticut school districts face increasingly tight budgets, the state should focus on reform efforts backed by research, Long writes. On Dec. 20, Long also participated in a discussion on the impact of increased class time…
The American Mathematical Society (AMS) named Carol Wood and Wis Comfort to its inaugural class of AMS Fellows. Wood is the Edward Burr Van Vleck Professor of Mathematics. She is an expert in mathematical logic and applications of model theory to algebra. Comfort is the Edward Burr Van Vleck Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus. He's an expert on point-set topology, ultrafilters, set theory and topological groups. The Fellows of the American Mathematical Society program recognizes members who have made outstanding contributions to the creation, exposition, advancement, communication and utilization of mathematics.
John Bonin, the Chester D. Hubbard Professor of Economics and Social Science, participated in the annual American Economic Association meetings in San Diego, Calif. from Jan. 3-6. He chaired two panel sessions and was a discussant for papers in two different sessions. Three generations of Wesleyan economists were present in the first morning session of the meetings: Bonin was the chair and Assistant Professor of Economics Melanie Khamis presented a joint paper with her student Romaine Campbell '13 on informal employment in Jamaican firms. Campbell has completed his course work and is finishing his honors thesis to fulfill the requirements…
Two book reviews by President Michael Roth recently were published in The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. For the Post on Dec. 28, Roth reviewed Hallucinations by Oliver Sacks, a "graceful and informative" study of hallucinations caused by "neurological misfirings that can be traced to disease, drugs or various changes in neurochemistry." Drawing upon descriptions of hallucinations experienced with Parkinsonian disorders, epilepsy, migraines, and narcolepsy, "Sacks explores the surprising ways in which our brains call up simulated realities that are almost indistinguishable from normal perceptions," Roth writes. He adds: "As is usually the case with the good doctor Sacks, we are prescribed no overarching theory or even a…
In an op-ed published Jan. 15 in The New York Times/ International Herald Tribune, Peter Rutland, Colin and Nancy Cambell Professor in Global Issues and Democratic Thought, professor of government and professor of Russian and Eastern European studies, contradicts the popular narrative that the current conflict in Mali is caused by militant Islam. Rather, he writes, “the core of the conflict is the nationalist secession movement of the Tuareg people — one that in recent months has been hijacked by Islamist radicals.” Rutland reminds readers: “In the Cold War, the West had a hard time separating out communism from nationalism. That failure…
Professor of Economics Richard Grossman had an op-ed in The Hartford Courant on Jan. 5 about negotiations over the "fiscal cliff" in Washington. He writes that though reasonable people may disagree over what top marginal tax rate is ideal for the economy, the stubborn resistance of Congressional Republicans to any tax increases is the product of ideology, not reason. Looking back over history, he writes, the "abdication of sound economic reasoning in favor of ideology" has resulted in numerous policy mistakes with long-lasting economic impacts. As an historical example, Grossman cites Britain's decision to return to the gold standard following…
David LowKrishna Winston, the Marcus L. Taft Professor of German Language and Literature, is the translator of Günter Grass's From Germany to Germany, published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in 2012. In January 1990, just months after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Günter Grass made two New Year’s resolutions: the first was to travel extensively in the newly united Germany and the second was to keep a diary, to record his impressions of a historic time. Grass takes part in public debates, writes for newspapers, makes speeches, and meets emerging politicians. He talks to German citizens on both sides, listening to their…
Stephen Angle is the author of Contemporary Confucian Political Philosophy, published by Polity in 2012. Angle is professor of philosophy, professor of East Asian studies, and tutor in the College of Social Studies. Confucian political philosophy has recently emerged as a vibrant area of thought both in China and around the globe. This book provides an accessible introduction to the main perspectives and topics being debated today, and shows why Progressive Confucianism is a particularly promising approach. Students of political theory or contemporary politics will learn that far from being confined to a museum, contemporary Confucianism is both responding to current…